Long time Missouri Western football coach gets fired

Missouri Western State University Director of Athletics Kurt McGuffin announced Thursday that football head coach Jerry Partridge has been relieved of his coaching duties.

“Coach Partridge has been a part of Griffon football for most of his adult life as a player, assistant coach and head coach, and I thank him for his hard work, his passion and his loyalty,” McGuffin said. “Our goal is to find a coach who can build on the foundation Jerry established to position our student-athletes for continued success on the field and in the classroom.”

Prior to becoming head coach in 1997, Partridge was the defensive coordinator at Missouri Western for five seasons under head coach Stan McGarvey. Partridge was also an assistant at Murray State (Ky.) University and Austin Peay University in Tennessee. He served as a graduate assistant coach at both the University of Notre Dame and the University of Missouri.

A national search for the seventh head coach in program history will begin immediately.

On July 21, 2010, the Griffon Indoor Sports Complex was completed and officially opened. The facility serves Griffon football, softball, baseball, soccer, men’s golf and women’s golf teams, and is the summer training camp home of the Kansas City Chiefs. The facility features a full 100-yard turf indoor field, a state-of-the-art locker room for the Griffon football team, which can accommodate up to 120 players, as well as coaches offices, a dedicated weight training facility for Griffon student-athletes, meeting rooms, a 120 seat theatre, equipment room and athletic training room. The facilities available to Griffon student-athletes rival those of any collegiate or professional sports organization.

Total cost of the building portion of the Griffon Indoor Sports Complex was $10.3 million.

The facility was thought to give a boost to the Missouri Western football program as it tries to compete with perennial powerhouse Northwest Missouri State from just up the road in Maryville.